


Losing an Illusion

by determamfidd



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: Character Vignettes, Character studies, F/M, M/M, Third By Experience, Third By Experience 'verse, by scarletjedi, happy bday mate :)))), set at the end of 'Comes Around Again' / beginning of 'We Are Made Wise'
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-31
Updated: 2017-03-31
Packaged: 2018-10-13 04:50:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10506639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/determamfidd/pseuds/determamfidd
Summary: "Losing an illusion makes you wiser than finding a truth." - Ludwig Börne...Set at the cusp of Scarletjedi's amazing fics, 'Comes Around Again' and the sequel, 'We Are Made Wise'......the Company reacts.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [scarletjedi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scarletjedi/gifts).



> Happy birthday, Jedi! *hugs* ilu, mate. Hope it was a good one, and hope you enjoy this!

Ori has known Gimli his whole life. Oil and water, true – they have never been much alike, and the very little they have in common hasn’t been enough to tie them closer together. Yet they have been friends all that time.

He had wondered why his often brash, loud playmate had suddenly become so measured and quiet at times. Why he had grown steadier, and why the look in his eye had grown older.

To learn of Gimli’s second nature is a bolt of wonder to Ori. He is brimming with questions; he must know more! Gimli has walked through mysteries and wonders, and he does not speak of them to any save his husband, who is equally mysterious. Oh, they talk and laugh and argue readily enough – they are _friendly_ enough, to any who would speak with them.

Ori cannot. Ori is tongue-tied in the face of it all. He can’t muster up the words to speak to one of his oldest friends, because he isn’t quite sure who that friend has become. And he’s too aware now of his own differences: the gaping marks upon his face which twist his eye. He’s even more a recluse these days than he used to be.  

Yet there is just so much _more_ that Ori would know.

…

Bifur carves buttons carefully out of soft, gold-yellow birch and polishes them until they glow. He presents them to Dori with a smile.

Each one has every prayer he knows, pressed into them with every pass of his knife.

…

Óin does not understand, not clearly, and it frustrates him. Óin has made a lifetime’s work of understanding. He seeks out causes and effects, and writes them down in his neat cramped hand. Óin has always wanted the world to make more sense than it does.

He was fairly overjoyed when he thought Gimli had the gift of sight. Óin’s own far-seeing abilities are limited in scope, nowhere near as clear or detailled as those of his mother or grandmother, and so it had filled him with pride to learn that Gimli might have the full extent of that power – a power that was fast leaving their people. To learn that this had been a lie all along? Near broke his heart.

The reason behind the lie had been _staggering._

Gimli is not truly as he is. Gimli, his young fluff-bearded tagalong, has already run the course of his life through and more besides, and he does not see the future – he has _lived it._

He will not soon forget the sight of his nephew, grown into the full measure of his strength and years, fighting with the fury of a thousand demons and glowing like a red sunrise. No, he shall not forget that sight for as long as he lives.

As long as he keeps that vision before his mind’s eye, perhaps the understanding will follow.

…

Dwalin has been accused at times of constant anger. And true enough, he is often angry. But that is not all there is to it.

Dwalin is a worrier.

Only a few select people know it. He doesn’t show it easily, after all. Those who have known him since they were pebbles together - Dis, Balin, Thorin – these folk know, and understand that his brusque gruffness comes from a place of pure concern.

So when Dwalin snaps at Gimli, biting the words off between his teeth, they _know_ he is not angry with the lad (if lad he may still be called). They know he doesn’t hold the circumstances of Gimli’s… changes against him, in any way. They see his flat glare linger upon Gimli’s shorn curls, and they understand that he is frightened for his student.

Gimli himself hunkers down, his shoulders rising and his bare chin held high. He is defiant in the face of Dwalin’s furious care, but he remains steady and immovable for all that. It is not many who can stand before the force of Dwalin unscathed.

And that, more than anything, reassures Dwalin somewhat.

(He’ll worry privately, nevertheless. They’ve all come too close: they’ve understood some things nearly too late, and Dwalin is still very aware of what they nearly lost.)

(He won’t see it happen. Not on his watch, not again. He’s learned the cost of being too late.)

(He supposes he can trust Gimli to see it done. His best student, after all.)

(But nothing will stop him from worrying.)

…

Dori will see to it that Gimli is kitted out in the very best of _everything._

He will make sure that the little Hobbitish jacket and waistcoat is perfect, down to the very minutest detail. He will ensure that there are plenty of pockets for a dwarf-in-disguise to hide his knickknacks. He will give Gimli the hardiest travel-pack they have: the one with the most cunning concealed sections, made of the lightest and strongest material he can contrive.

His hands will work and work. He will embroider and stitch and hem and resize. He will confer with Bilbo for hours, if he must. He will make sure that nothing – _nothing_ – can penetrate Gimli’s disguise. Not if it is something he can help. Not after all Gimli has done.

It still gives him the cold sweats, sometimes. Ori is not so very much older than Gimli. They were of an age at their lessons.

No, he will see it done. He will make every leafy eyelet, every Shire-flowered embellished collar, with his own two hands, and it will be as perfect as he can make it.

If Gimli _must_ insist on throwing himself into unspeakable danger (again), then Dori cannot stop him. Not even death stopped him, after all.

Dori adds the last flower to a shirtsleeve, and holds it up before his eyes. It’s not battle-armour, but it’s the best he can do. He hopes it will, at least, do the job of guarding Gimli’s back.

…

Kili is glad and annoyed, in equal measure.

Glad beyond words, in some ways. Because here Gimli and Legolas stand, and they have trod the path that he would tread with Tauriel, many years prior (or is it many years hence? Kili can’t talk about time properly, it makes his head ache after a while).

They are already _married,_ or will be. Elf and Dwarf, Dwarf and Elf, and they are _married._ They draw the talk and the novelty of it all away from himself and his starlight-lady. Because they are here, Kili’s love is not a strange and novel thing: he is not a lone creature against a tide. He is swimming in Gimli’s slipstream, and it is easier there. Calmer.

And because Gimli has lived this already, he knows exactly how Kili feels; there is someone of his own people who _understands_ him. He has a friend who may clap him on his back and congratulate him with nothing but uncomplicated joy in his heart.

Still, Kili is annoyed. Durin’s boots and braids, he is so, SO annoyed.

Because no matter how old he grows, not even if he lives to be four hundred?

He will _never_ be able to grow a beard as long, full and fine as the one he saw upon Gimli’s older face during the battle.

…

Bofur is trying desperately not to laugh. Or cry.

But the sight of him! Oh Mahal, it’s too good. Possibly the humour is made even more pointed by just how _terrible_ it all is: all the boy’s fine hair, shorn so close and dyed a sandy brown. It would break anybody’s heart. It would break Bofur’s… in fact, it does.

But the look on Gimli’s face is not one of anguish: it’s sheer, undiluted _grumpiness._ For once, Gimli looks exactly like his bad-tempered cousins upon the elder branches of his family tree.

He brushes aside the concerned looks with a short, brisk sort of nonchalance. It doesn't do a great job of hiding the unhappiness beneath. Still, that he can conceal it at all is a feat of some note: no Dwarf suffers to be shorn thus, but Gimli must. Perhaps Gimli can master his unhappiness, considering he’s not sixty-something, but truly two-hundred and sixty-something? Bofur’s eyes are tearing up, and he’s not sure whether it is in sympathy or in hilarity. A Dwarf all done up like a Hobbit! Bofur would have roared with laughter, once upon a time, and fallen off his perch upon this broken table. But these days he’s a mite more aware of the goings-on _behind_ the doings of the upper set, and they’re not all as pleasant as he imagined them to be.

Less beer, for one.

Now? Now he bites down hard on his tongue, because where Gimli’s going he doesn’t need Bofur’s laughter ringing in his ears. Nor his pity.

No, Gimli will only receive his pride.

…

Balin can feel the furious words crowding upon his tongue every time he looks at the lad; he feels his chest swell with indignation and his ears sizzle. Yet he strangles them every time and they go unsaid.

_So many secrets, barafun! So many secrets spilled carelessly, to any waiting ear! Did you think, even for a moment, did you consider how precious they were before you cast them away without a second thought?_

He is not like the others, bemused and disbelieving, unsure of the familiar stranger in their midst. He recognises his student, and worse, he recognises his own teaching. The new Gimli is polished and well-spoken: a statesman, diplomat and mediator himself, and a negotiator to rival Balin’s own skill. He is measured and thoughtful where once he was brash and impulsive. Still plenty of fire in the boy, to be sure, but he is less likely to reach for his axe and more likely to listen.

Balin can see his own hand in each of these. He recognises the genteel turn-and-incline of Gimli’s short-cropped head as the mirror-image of his own. The shadow of all his lessons is in every one of Gimli’s courtly bows.

Most of him is delighted. What teacher does not rejoice in seeing their student excel?

Yet a small, persistent part of him grumbles loudly at the sound of Khuzdul in the mouth of an Elf.

…

Nori could say many, many things about his journey to Erebor, if he had a mind. But what he _will_ say, is this:

“Never bet against Gimli son of Glóin. He has a way of changing the odds on you.”

…

They call him the Golden King of Silver Fountains, and Fili doesn’t believe a word of it. They call him other things, when they think he cannot hear. It is as though they believe that having a bum leg has somehow affected his hearing as well. He doesn’t feel like a King. Nor does he feel like the other, less kind names that people whisper as he passes upon his elven staff.

Thank Mahal for Dain and his blunt, honest care. And thank Mahal doubly for Kili and Gimli, for without their good humour and optimism he could not even stand here and lift his head before his people.

His _people._

That still sounds… very odd. Fili always imagined that it would be Thorin standing where he is now. But Fili is King, and Thorin is not, and Kili is in love with an _Elf_ , and Gimli is… whatever Gimli is.

Not seeing the future, but seeing a different world. One in which Fili and his brother are dead. Shattered leg or no, King or no, Fili much prefers this one.

And when Gimli lifts his old eyes, set in far too young a face and glowing with determination, the old battle-frisson shivers down Fili’s spine.

Yes, he much prefers this one. And he’ll fight tooth and nail for it, bum leg or no.

..

Gimli son of Glóin, they said, and he was known throughout the lands. A famous lord, a hero. Gimli son of Glóin, of the Nine walkers. Gimli son of Glóin, of the Fellowship of the Ring.

The mantra beats and beats away inside his mind.

_“I am not a stranger, Adad. I am as I have always been, Gimli, son of Glóin.”_

Once, Glóin was only the youngest son of Gróin, the hot-natured one with the head for figures. He was a ‘son of’ and that was well enough, because he was untried and green, untempered as raw iron is.

Nobody had ever needed to ask Glóin, “so which one is your son?” It was obvious. They were just so alike in appearance, the pair of them, the child-Gimli like a miniature replica of his father. It made Suhni laugh and smile indulgently at times, to see her husband’s likeness writ so small. “This must be your son!” was the more usual greeting from new acquaintances, and who couldn’t see it?

No forge-fire has ever tempered a better blade than the ones that Gimli has passed through. No iron has ever been truer. No blade keener.

Once, Gimli was spoken of as though he were Glóin’s son. Gimli was his son. Gimli, son of Glóin. He was famed and honoured throughout the world as such.

Now, he rather thinks that he will go down in history as Gimli’s father.

…

Thorin chokes on his guilt, over and again. His glance slides off Fili’s leg more often than not, and he grips Bilbo’s hand with a desperation he wasn’t even aware he could feel.

But it is the day that Gimli pushes back his hood to show his shorn head that Thorin must swallow, and swallow, and swallow, lest the guilt come spilling out of him in a flood. His eyes fill, and he must blink at the ceiling to get himself under control.

This, of all things, is not his doing, he knows. The ring is not his doing. They have all decided in concert the best course of action to take. Even the wisest of the Elves has agreed.

He has treated his young cousin abominably. And Gimli has been nothing but true - he has given so much, and now gives even _more –_

It is unfair. It is harsh. It is unjust. It is the only thing that can be done. 

Thorin has lived long enough to be very aware of the unfairness of the world.

…

It is a wrench to part with it. He has carried it all this way, through fire and water and danger. But another’s need is greater, and so part with it he must.

Bombur tucks the little package of ground _kafé_ into Gimli’s pack on the sly, and checks to see that nobody is coming. No, he’s in the clear.

So he takes the opportunity to stuff a couple of bags worth of smoked nuts into the overcrowded pack as well. Why not? They’re good for travelling. Gimli will be hungry all the time, growing adolescent that he is. All of Bombur’s young ones were ravenous pits at that age.

He gives the pack a little pat as he replaces the flap and does up the straps. Then he scurries away as fast as he can. He wishes he might be able to see Gimli’s face when he discovers his gift.

After all, a little taste of the familiar is as good as home, when you’re far away.

…

Bilbo is absolutely, completely sure that his feet have _never_ looked that disreputable.

Not once. Not even for an instant. In his entire _life_.

(It breaks his heart to see Gimli with such feet. It truly does.)

…

 


End file.
